Under The Gun
by Leaf on the Wind
Summary: A bunch of dead people with no reason to die. Their story, lots of technical stuff, also three OCs from Vegas Marine Case by Silver Hair Fox, Three CSIs Sitting In A Row, etc. Very slight romance, rated T because I'm careful.
1. No Apparent COD

"Jenne, get your ass in here!" The lab rat could hear her boss's angry cry down the hall, through a closed door, and over the music blasting through the headphones tightly clamped over her ears. Maddy scurried down the hall, lab coat flapping, and skidded to a halt standing in the doorway of Ecklie's office.

"Well, my ass is here, what did you want with it, Conrad?" She smiled and curtsied clumsily, two dainty fingers holding the edge of her coat like a skirt.

Ecklie cleared his throat, beady eyes running up and down her curves. Maddy quickly pulled the lab coat shut, blocking his view down her red sequined tube top.

"You're in the field today, Pam called in sick. You got eight DBs in an abandoned house; Natasha will tell you more on the scene. Everyone's already there."

Maddy's blue-and-green eyes went wide with delight and she held up one hand for a high five. Ecklie just stared at her raised hand, so she turned on her heel and left the office, mentally congratulating herself on both the field work soon to come, and flustering Ecklie so thoroughly. In moments, she had packed and her dusty, old, sky blue Volkswagen beetle was speeding down the road, away from the lab and towards a promising adventure.

XoXoXoXoX

The light from Catherine's flashlight bounced off David's glasses as he looked up from the final corpse. "Just like the others. Lividity is fixed; she died where she is now, no blood around, though we won't know until we've flipped her if she's got any wounds that could've killed her. No ligature marks, and no sign of a struggle. She must have been sedated somehow…"

Sara and Catherine sighed at his words. All eight victims had been in the same situation. They were exactly where they'd died, nothing to suggest an unnatural death, the only distinguishing feature being the ordinariness of their demise.

After a few more photos, the women examined the rest of the body, then packed it away in the van with seven companions, all with a one-way ticket to the coroner's office.

The two women joined the rest of the graveyard shift inside, standing to one side of Grissom, who was lecturing his CSIs.

Sara noticed that Maddy had joined them, her now platinum-blonde hair radiating light in the dim room. The lab-tech was standing in between Nick and Greg, Warrick was standing right behind her. The youngest CSI was holding a whispered side-talk with the boys surrounding her, completely ignoring Grissom. Natasha and Brass were in one corner, fingers entwined, eyes shining as they gazed at each other. When Catherine saw this, she fought the urge gag. "How cutesy," she thought at the star-crossed lovers, wondering how they always seemed to get away with their public displays of affection while in Grissom's presence.

XoXoXoXoX

"Oh, classy," Nick said, holding up a pair of black lace panties in one gloved hand. He stuck them into an evidence bag, labeling it and moving on to another section of the room he was clearing with Maddy.

She rolled her eyes, collecting a mint tin full of pot. "This may not have killed them, but if they had enough in their systems, it could've made it easier for them to be attacked." Maddy bagged the pot and looked over at Nick.

"State your source," Nick said, smiling mischievously.

"Uh, I went to high school, Mr. Stokes," Maddy replied, her voice oozing sarcasm. "Don't tell me you've never been high?"

Nick laughed; deliberately leaving her question unanswered, and bagged the last piece of evidence. "Looks like we're done here."

Maddy marred her porcelain face with a scowl, narrowing her eyes and trying to look as menacing as a five-foot-four lab rat with fluorescent hair can look. "Aren't you going to answer me?"

XoXoXoXoX

"Sara, take a look at this…" Warrick was holding up a wineglass with lipstick smudges around the rim. "Do you remember if anyone was wearing lipstick?"

"I don't think so," Sara said, taking the glass from him and placing it carefully in an evidence bag, making a mental note to run a DNA test on it.

At that moment, Natasha stumbled into the room, the heel of one of her boots catching underneath a rug. She knelt down, pulling on a pair of latex gloves as she did so, and lifted it up. She shined her flashlight down and noticed an auburn hair. Taking out her tweezers, she picked up the hair and put it in a small manila envelope, labeling where she'd found it.

"Anything I can help with?" she asked, noticing the large pile of evidence bags the two CSIs had collected in the center of the room, a wine glass balancing precariously on top of the mound.

"I think we've cleared this room, but you can help us carry some stuff," Sara said, motioning towards the heap of odds and ends.

Rolling her eyes, Tasha held a few of the more durable items in one hand, the wineglass in the other, and started to carry them out to the mass of squad cars parked outside, wondering if she would have to use her master Tetris skills to fit everything in, or whether they'd have to make a second trip.

XoXoXoXoX

Nick and Greg looked at David expectantly. "Why are we here?" Greg asked in an impatient tone.

"I found something I thought might be of interest. You see this bruise around her wrist?" He gestured at one of the victim's arms, where, sure enough, a purplish discoloration had wound around. "It looks like a hand. There are the fingers and the palm," he said, tracing the outline of a hand with one latex-covered finger.

"So…what's that mean?" Nick asked. "I don't think we can lift a fingerprint off a dead body."

"You can try, can't you?" David said. He seemed very determined that his find wouldn't go unnoticed.

"Sure, whatever you say," Greg replied, taking out a brush and some print powder. He thought better of his decision, though, and looked at Nick. "You want to superglue it?"

Nick grinned and left to get fuming supplies.

A while later, the three men were standing around a small tent made out of plastic sheets, watching fumes from the acrylic resin settle on the dead woman.

Once they were sure any prints would have shown up, the tent was dismantled and Nick inspected her wrist. "Hey, get me a picture and a tape lift of this, then we'll run it through AFIS and see if we can get a hit. You should get prints off the other victims, too, for comparison.

XoXoXoXoX

"What have you got for us, Doc?" Catherine asked as she walked briskly into the morgue, Grissom at her heels.

"Not much," Doctor Robbins sighed dejectedly. "No signs of struggle on any of them, no ligature marks, defensive wounds…" He trailed off. "I sent some samples out with David, but nothing on them suggests poison."

"There are such things as untraceable poisons, you know," Grissom said knowingly. "We might be dealing with a botanist. Something killed these people; we just have to follow the evidence to find out what."

Catherine rolled her eyes at Doctor Robbins, both of them feeling somewhat skeptical about Grissom's motivational speaking skills. They'd heard them a million times.

Grissom caught the look that passed between his colleagues, but dismissed it and left the morgue, deciding to return to his office, maybe reread his copy of A Fly for the Prosecution, one of his favorite forensic entomology studies.

XoXoXoXoX

A/N: That's it for the first chapter, the second will be written by Silver Hair Fox, who's character (Natasha Haan) joins mine (Maddy) in a bunch of these fictions, and she likes to get in on the action of writing. Maybe she'll know what killed these people, because I sure as hell don't! Reviews are appreciated!

Maddy


	2. Untraceable Poison

A/N: Well, looks like I got stuck writing this chapter anyway…As soon as I'm done I'm going to go grumble at Nikki to write the next one. I've done all the hard stuff, she needs to shoulder some of the burden…

XoXoXoXoX

"I just got the results back from your blood samples," David said as he burst through the doors of the morgue, a few papers clutched in one hand.  
Doctor Robbins looked up from the cadaver he was putting into one of the drawers.

"They're wasted as hell and stoned out of their minds. All eight of them. It kind of looks like a frat party."

"Well, they had to be sedated somehow…" Doctor Robbins looked at David. "Do you want to get Grissom in here? He hasn't had a chance to thoroughly inspect anyone, he may have missed something."

"Alright." David was off and searching for the nightshift supervisor before the words had fully left his mouth. The door to the morgue banged shut behind him, and Doctor Robbins laughed a little at his enthusiasm.

XoXoXoXoX

Maddy jumped as her printer whirred to life. The results from the hair Natasha had found were slowly making their way onto the printer's tray. She snatched them up, some not-yet-dry ink smudging her fingers as she did so. Pulling out her cell phone and admiring the Hello Kitty stickers all over the bubblegum pink case, she dialed Grissom, then Natasha.

Moments later, there was a knock on her door and both people walked in. "We got a hit off CODIS. What you wouldn't do for the paper in my hands, eh, Grissom?" She nudged his arm jokingly and winked.

"Yes, Maddy, I'd do anything," Grissom said, an uncharacteristic smile playing across his usually expressionless face.

Maddy blanched at the smile he was wearing, shoving the paper at him. "There, take it, just don't smile like that!"

Grissom laughed, taking the paper and smoothing out the creases. "Victoria Anderson, last known residence out in West End. I'll phone Brass. The four of us should be enough for one investigation, right girls?"

Both girls nodded, heading to the locker room to grab coats and kits.

As Grissom was leaving the office, David caught up to him. "Robbins wants you to examine the bodies, thinks he may have missed something."

Grissom sighed and called down the hall to Maddy and Natasha. "Looks like I'll have to miss our little outing, take Greg with you! The field work will be good for him."

Maddy grinned and gave him a thumbs-up before hurrying off to get her coat and find Greg, currently residing in the break room with his third cup of coffee.

"C'mon, Greggo, we're out in the field! Investigating a suspect who is quite possibly dangerous!"

Greg put his coffee cup down on the counter. Only Maddy could pull him away from a quiet break with the TV and a warm mug of Blue Hawaiian. He followed her out the door, watching her brilliantly white pigtails bob in front of him as she skipped down the hall.

XoXoXoXoX

Pam sat at Nick's house, looking over the crime scene photos. The circumstances of the eight victims were more or less the same, all of them in their early twenties, none with any identification.

"What about that hair? Did it turn up any DNA matches?"

"Yeah, aVictoria Anderson. Maddy, Greg, and Tasha are on their way with Brass to go check her out," Nick said, wrapping his arm tighter around her waist.

"Alright," Pam replied, snuggling up in the blanket she was wrapped in and slurping some chicken soup from the bowl on her lap. "I'll finish this and then I want to go to bed. I'm beat."

Nick smiled and stood up, gathering the photos and sticking them back into their manila folder. About ten minutes later, both of them had drifted off into a pleasant sleep right there on the couch, the empty bowl sitting on the coffee table, forgotten.

XoXoXoXoX

Brass and Natasha led the way up a flight of steps to a dingy, off-white house in suburban Vegas. Greg trailed behind, waiting for Maddy, who was pushing a pair of wire-rimmed reading glasses up her nose. "They're cute," he thought. "They make her look sort of studious, though."

Brass rapped smartly on the door. No sound came from inside. After a few more attempts, he called out. "Las Vegas PD, I'm coming in!"

He tried the knob and found it unlocked, and then entered the deserted house. On the mantle there was a framed photograph depicting all eight victims, accompanied by a black-haired woman. "We still don't have a warrant, let's come back to it later," he said.

Maddy looked wistfully at the photograph before returning to the cool comfort of the car, crammed in the backseat with three field kits and Greg. "The woman in the picture had black hair, but the hair Tasha found was red…What's going on here?" she thought, staring out the window as the dismal neighborhood flashed by.

XoXoXoXoX

The doors to the morgue clattered open as Grissom walked in. "Well, Al, what is it you wanted me to have a look at?"

"I'm not really sure. I thought you might want to scrape their fingernails or something, I'm not a CSI."

"Alright then." Grissom walked over to a table on which the first of the victims was, a dark-haired man with a sharp nose.

Snapping on a pair of gloves, Grissom lifted one of the man's hands, carefully scraping underneath his fingernails onto a piece of paper, which in turn he tipped into a small envelope. Doing the same with the other hand, he sealed up the envelope and looked up.

"Get me another body; I'm done with this one."

The next body was a woman with red hair and full lips. Her eyes were green beneath closed lids.

"Did you send everyone's DNA to Maddy for comparison?" he asked.

"Yes, but she's out in the field right now, she won't have gotten anything done on it yet."

Grissom swore under his breath, pulling out his cell phone and calling Maddy.

"Jenne," she answered brightly.

"Maddy, it's Grissom. I need you to get back here and process all the DNA evidence. I can send Warrick to pick you up if it's a problem."

"Actually, Grissom, send Warrick to pick all of us up. Brass's car just broke down and we've got no way to get back to the lab."

XoXoXoXoX

Catherine and Sara were reconstructing a window they'd found broken at the crime scene. The frame was laid out on a table, along with all the shards of glass they could find. Both women were bored of the puzzle, trying to fit pieces to the pieces of glass jutting out from the edge of the frame, but neither had any choice.

"This is important," Sara told herself. "The Haeckel marks indicate that the window was broken from the outside, meaning the killer probably wasn't in the house with the group before he or she committed the murders. We have to find the original point of where they glass was struck. We can figure out roughly how tall they were by where the point of origin is."

Catherine took one of the larger pieces of glass and fit it evenly into a space between two others, smiling a little.

Sara picked up a smaller bit and fit it in beside Catherine's large piece. "I guess this isn't so bad," she said out loud.

Catherine smiled. "Yeah, it really is," she replied. Both women burst out laughing at the crap job Grissom had assigned them, cursing him through their giggles. Once they'd regained their composure, it was back to the jigsaw puzzle.

XoXoXoXoX

Maddy settled down in her swivel chair, then began the tedious process of running all the DNA samples through CODIS, also comparing them to the hair. She wilted when she found out that the hair belonged to one of the victims. "At least that's one with a name," she thought dejectedly.

After an hour or so she'd managed to identify all eight victims. She paged Greg, asking him sweetly to take the results to Grissom while she worked on the wine glass.

He glowered for a moment but took the papers, dashing off to find Grissom and leaving Maddy to smile and gloat over her victory to herself.

After a few moments, she turned her attention to the wineglass. She was delighted to find that the DNA matched none of the victims, and set about running a sample through CODIS, though it was devoid of any matches.

"Our killer doesn't have a rap sheet. Interesting."

XoXoXoXoX

Grissom thumbed through a large, leather-bound volume. The DNA results had been discarded on his desk; he had turned his mind to greater things.

His finger traced a list of untraceable poisons. It stopped its journey about halfway down. "Well, this seems interesting. Almost like the Adventure of the Sussex Vampire."

He smiled inwardly, trying to decide the best way to go about the investigation. "I'll start by rereading that story," he said out loud, taking down another book from the shelf and discarding the one about botany.

XoXoXoXoX


	3. Guns and Poisoning

**Chapter 3**

**Guns and Poisoning**

**By: Silver Hair Fox**

Sara got out of her Denali, as she got out she grabbed her flashlight, her latex gloves as well as a small amount of evidence bags. While she headed towards the crime scene an officer met her by the side of the door, "Every thing is still secure, Miss Sidle." He said staying in his spot. Both Sara and Catherine had needed a break from the window puzzle, and Sara, workaholic that she was, had gone back to the crime scene.

"Thanks," Sara said as she finished her way to the place where the eight civilians were murdered. She wasn't certain why she was inspecting the crime scene a second time nevertheless something drew her over to the remote corner. Where Nick as well as Maddy checked over the last time she was there. Sighing she got down on her knees. She pulled out her flashlight, turned the power on, and started sweeping the area with her flashlight. The light bounced off the walls then over the carpet, Sara became aware that the carpet was pulled up a bit. Moving closer she pulled it up and looked beneath the carpet. The light from her flashlight shinned on a gold 7.62mm shell casing, "I should get this to Natasha," Sara mumbled as she picked it up with her left hand. Holding it up she shinned the flashlight on it, she pulled out an evidence bag and placed the shell casing in the bag, and marked on it where she had found it. The noticed that the carpet was not nailed down or held down as a result she pulled the carpet back farther. And after she was finished she collected 48 shell casings. Placing the carpet back down she swept the room by way of her flashlight for a second time, picking up the 48 small evidence bags she stood up. She walked back to her Denali and opened the back; placing the evidence bags in her kit she closed the door. As she pulled her brown back she thought of what to do next.

"Is there anything I can help you with?" the officer asked, noticed that Sara pulled out her cell phone.

"No just stay here," Sara said, and dialed Catherine's phone number.

"Willows," Catherine responded.

"Catherine, are you back on the window?" Natasha asked.

"No, why?"

"Can you send Tasha and maybe Warrick back to the scene to check this out?"

"Your there?"

"Yes, and I found something quit interesting, but I'm to have Tasha going check it out." Sara replied.

"What would that be?"

"Shell casings."

"I'll send her down there." Catherine said as she hung up the phone.

"Great," Sara said as she put her cell phone back in her pocket. They had eight deceased, plus currently 48 shell casings.

It was going to be a time-consuming night for Natasha, trying to match the shell casings from the crime scene to the recorded casings in NIBIN, the National Integrated Ballistics Information Network and AFT. Being the second Ballistics expert in the CSI lab, Natasha worked on all the cases to do with Ballistics under Grissom, the other worked on all under Ecklie.

"Warrick, Tash," Catherine said walking into the break room finding them there, along with Brass; Nick who'd just gotten back from checking on Pam. Maddy was still in her lab.

"Yo," Warrick said looking up from the crime scene notes.

"Sara needs you to go to the crime scene," Catherine said walking over to the small refrigerator, "She found shell casings, but she's coming to help me with the window. She said she'd leave the casings for you."

Nick's eyes went wide for a second, "How many?"

"Not sure." Catherine said placing herself in a small black chair that was at the table.

"We'll head over there." Tasha said cheerfully as she left with Warrick.

Leaving only Nick, Catherine and Brass in the room that had glass walls Brass was the next to speak, "Guess it's going to be a long night."

"Yeah for her," Catherine said opening the small bottle of water.

"Is there something going on between you and Tasha?" Nick asked.

"No why?" Catherine answered.

"You seem a little pissed off with her," Nick pushed on.

"I'm not, believe me."

"If you say so," Brass said as he got up and left the room leaving Nick and Catherine alone together.

"Catherine what is your problem with her," Nick asked.

"PDA" Catherine answered then took a drink of her water.

"PDA?"

"Public Displays of Affection."

"With Brass."

"Didn't you see it when we were at the crime scene?"

"I was listening to what Grissom was saying, not watching other people."

"They were googing at each other."

"So, it's not like… you like Brass." Nick said, smiling.

"I do not."

"You do so, other wise you would have mind."

"I don't like Brass, it's just that I wasn't allowed to date Warrick but now she can date him. If you ask me, that's more than a little unfair."

"Okay," Nick said with a smile and a roll of his eyes.

"What?" Grissom asked walking in with an empty cup in hand.

"Nothing Gil." Catherine said to him then turned to Nick, "I don't like him," she said in a stern tone and left the break room.

"What's with her?" Grissom asked pouring himself a cup of coffee.

"PMS." Nick said then turned his attention to a forensics magazine. Grissom sat down at the table and looked at him. Nick took his attention back off the magazine and looked at him, "Find anything interesting about the case yet?" she asked.

"Just that I may have found the poison." He answered.

"The tox screen was negative, Grissom." Nick answered, "News travels fast."

"Some poisons are untraceable," Grissom added, and took his glasses off.

"So what do you think it is?"

"Curare."

Flipside of the CSIs Natasha was on her cell phone, "Maddy did you find anything?" Natasha asked as she sat in the comfort of her new silver Hummer.

"Just an ID on all eight vics, but nothing on the DNA I found on the wine glass," Maddy said as she spun around in her chair.

"Madds quit spinning or your going to get motion sick." Natasha said with a sunny smile.

Maddy stopped and looked around, "You don't have camera's watching me do you?"

"No, but when ever I get back I'll fingerprint the shell casings and if I have anything we can run them through AFIS and then see if we get a hit."

"Sounds good, in the mean time what am I supposed to do?" Maddy asked.

"Bug Greg." Natasha said as she let the call dye. Natasha opened the door of her Hummer and got out she placed her hands on her hips. Her gun and ID was visible on her the belt of her low riders. She still had her latex gloves on. She looked around, wishing that she had Pamela and Maddy with her as well to help her look. Natasha turned the power on her flashlight and started looking around the building, hoping to find the weapon that was used. Warrick had already gone inside. As she looked around she stepped in a small hole that made her trip, pulling her left leg out she rubbed it, "What the hell was that?" she asked herself out loud.

"What was what?" Warrick asked walking up behind her.

Natasha jumped and held her breath as she turned around her hair landing on her left shoulder, "Damn it Warrick, you scared me," Natasha answered flipping her hair back.

"Sorry," Warrick said helping her up, "You still didn't answer my question though."

"I stepped in a hole, and I think something was at the bottom of it." Natasha said as she pulled out her flashlight again and turned it on.

"Why don't we have a look then." Warrick said as he knelt down to have a look at what was in it. To his shock he grabbed his latex gloves and pulled them on then reached down the hole to pull out a smallish silver-plated revolver, "Guess what I found."

"Something interesting I would guess." Natasha answered. Warrick pushed himself up with his free hand and passed the revolver over to Natasha. Natasha smiled dreamily as she held it up, "Warrick, you know how to turn a girl's head."

"Tell me what it is." Warrick said.

"A gun," Natasha joked.

"I was looking more of a specific answer Tasha." Warrick said with a half of a smile, "Since it is your department."

Natasha balanced the revolver in her left hand and with the other shinned the light from her flashlight. It was now around 11 at night and with the streetlight in the distance it didn't give much light. With better light, Warrick could see the pistol better now: a silver plated snub nose revolver with a white handle, the word _Valor_ in black within double black circles on the left side of the grip. _Cal 32 S _and a funky letter_ W lg_ had been stamped on the left side of the barrel. Plus a _made in Germany_ – and the scraped –off place where the serial numbers would have been – were apparent on the right side. Fondly, Natasha said, "Gertsenberger and Eberwein, Gersetten-Gussenstabt."

Warrick stared at her then said, "Gesundheit."

Cheerfully ignoring the statement she went on: "It's a Valor. A six-shot revolver that fires, just like it says on the barrel, thirty-two caliber Smith and Wesson cartridges, long."

"That's one I've never heard of." Warrick admitted.

"No reason you should have," Natasha said with a shrug that let him off the hook, "These were originally twenty-twos, starter pistols."

"Starter pistols?"

She nodded; her resonantly put up ponytail swinging, "Yup, then they were modified. In the mid-sixties, these little angels were imported over here form Germany and sold as Valor's… but they were outlawed by the 1968 Gun Control Act. Our find doesn't look like it has been down there since the 1968… so its safe to say that this little one was sold in Europe."

"And smuggled into this country."

Natasha nodded cannily, "And smuggled into this country."

"How do you even know this stuff? The thing's been illegal in the U.S for thirty-five years, before you were even born, I have never heard of them, let alone seen one, and you know everything about it."

She gave him a compassionate smile, "It was only a year before I was born. And it's what I do."

"Well, that explains everything."

"Of course." Natasha smiled, "let's get this back to the lab so I can take a closer look at it."

"What ever you say." Warrick answered slightly shaking his head, "You are going to have to tell every one who asks that little speech ain't you?"

"Most likely." Natasha said holding the gun in her left hand as they made their way back to her Hummer and his SUV.

Once they got there Warrick just had to ask, "Why a Hummer?"

"I like them, they are also charming," Natasha said with a beamy smile.

"And big."

"Be nice."

Once they got to the lab, "Do you need help?" Warrick asked, seeing Natasha holding the Valor in one arm now in a bag and the other caring the 48 shell casings.

"Nope, I'll be in the lab." Natasha said as she handed him the Valor, "Oh… Can you check for prints on this?"

"Sure," Warrick answered as he took the pistol. They parted ways.

If the walls of the crime lab were meant to be reassuring, they did not comprise whichever of that result on Natasha. Fact believed she was oblivious of her surrounding, lost in her occupation plus music that played through the headphones she was neither annoyed nor worried, although her frown of concentration might make the casual observer think otherwise. Balanced on the end of her chair in front of her computer, with her long brown hair with blonde streaks pulled back in a loose bun, Natasha was hard at work trying to match the shell casings she had found at the crime scene to AK-47 casings in NIBIN. She was hoping to hit pay dirt with the AFT database. She had plenty of shell casings to enter, 48 to be exact. All of that had to be entered before she could even begin to address the thirty-two-caliber Valor revolver that Warrick had pulled out of the hole, by the crime scene. That gun now with Warrick for fingerprinting. She hadn't heard the door open, but she sensed something and looked up to see Grissom standing there. Natasha pulled off her headphones.

"How're you doing?" Grissom asked with a small smile that managed to convoy so much as an apology for interrupting; pride in her work; and natural curiosity.

She gave him a less complex smile and said, "Let's just say it's going to be a long shift."

"But your making progress with the shell casings right?"

"Slowly, news travels fast I take it?"

"Warrick told me, but keep at it." Grissom said and left the room. Natasha shook her head and went back at her work.


	4. Voids

A/N: Sorry it took so long to update. I guess I got caught up in other things. Hey everyone, congratulate me on a good-looking person liking me! It totally made my day.

Madds

XoXoXoXoX

"Got a hit off the print from the body," Maddy said. She'd been filling in as a print analyst as well as her usual post as lab technician and CSI for the latest case. "It matches a Janet Green."

"Thanks, Madds," Warrick said, taking the paper. "You found her on AFIS, what was she busted for? She works someplace that takes prints?"

"It wasn't AFIS. On a hunch, I ran the print through VICAP. Our suspect has been missing for four years."

Warrick grinned at her, despite the perplexity of the case. He hurried off down the corridor to find Grissom. When he arrived at his supervisor's office, however, he found Brass there as well.

"We finally got a warrant for the victims' houses," he said, waving a paper at Warrick and sighing. "Their various family members were very stubborn about letting us have a little look around." He frowned.

"Well, what are we waiting for? Let's roll," Warrick said, turning on his heel and heading off to get his kit and tell the CSIs that they were going on a trip.

XoXoXoXoX

Sara took the photograph down from the mantle. Maddy had mentioned, when she found out that Sara would be canvassing Victoria Anderson's house, that there had been a suspicious woman in the picture with the eight victims. She stuck it in an evidence bag and crouched to the ground to pick up something that had caught her eye.

A small piece of glass lay on the hardwood floor. "Maybe this is from the window," Sara thought, picking it up with tweezers and putting it in an envelope. "But that would mean the killer came back here after she, or he, committed the murders."

Going with her gut feeling, she stood up and turned back to the mantle, noticing that it was covered with a thin film of dust. She saw that where the photograph she'd taken had been, there was a void in the grime that had built up. She scanned the small ledge above the fireplace, looking for similar voids. At the very edge of the shelf she found a small, circular shape in the dust. It was relatively dirt-free, indicating it had been taken somewhat recently.

Holding her camera to her eyes, Sara snapped a few pictures. "Looks like it could be a vase or some kind of award…"she said out loud, trailing off. "Maybe the base of a candlestick holder?" she asked herself. Taking one last picture, she turned to the rest of the house.

"Anything I can help you with, ma'am?" the police officer standing guard said politely.

"No, thanks," Sara declined. "Unless you're trained as a CSI, that is. We have eight houses to process and only eight analysts, so we're all working solo today."

The officer nodded sympathetically. Sara turned from him and began to examine the rest of the house. Nothing more was of much interest, though she managed to bag a bra that looked like it matched the panties Nick had found at the crime scene. "This is nice," she thought, holding the lingerie up to her chest, though not close enough to transfer. Even her interest didn't come before her immaculate CSI instincts. "Maybe I should invest in a set."

At that moment, the officer walked back in. Spotting Sara, he turned around and walked quickly out of the room, leaving her, hiding her embarrassment, to bag the bra while trying to maintain the oncoming fit of giggles.

XoXoXoXoX

Pamela sat up and stretched. She had just woken up from a nice, long nap and was feeling considerably better. "Maybe I'll stay home today and go back in tomorrow," she thought, already scheming. She picked up the pictures from the crime scene and studied them for the umpteenth time, her sharp eyes searching for some missed detail, some neglected piece of crucial evidence.

Looking back over some pictures Natasha had taken of the room she'd processed alone, she noticed a void in the dust on the floor. It was small and circular, next to a shoe print that Tasha had tapelifted. She saw it all in her mind.

_Natasha crouched on the ground, all her equipment in her hands. She used the electrostatic print lifter to recover the footprint, taking a few photos beforehand to insure that they would have the print, no matter what. _

_Standing up, she turned, barely registering the circular hole in the layer of dust. She turned to the rest of the room, sighing at the work to be done, and moved on, leaving the void untouched, undisturbed, unrecorded._

Pam took out her cell phone, dialing Grissom, who was doing a perimeter on a house. He picked up the phone on the second ring. "Grissom," he said briskly.

"Hey, it's Pam. I think I found something in the crime scene photos. There's this space in the dust next to an unidentified footprint. I think our killer was walking, saw it, and crouched down to pick it up. Whatever it was, it was important enough to delay the culprit long enough to grab it."

"Good work, Pam," Grissom said. "Give that to Nick, or fax it to the lab. We'll have some people working on it soon."

XoXoXoXoX

"Hey, Gris, who was that?" Maddy asked. She was at the same scene as Grissom. He'd called her in to help him process the mansion that had belonged to one of the victims, allowing the small, dirty house she'd been investigating to wait.

"Pam, she found something," he said nonchalantly, turning to his younger colleague. The sun beat down on the two of them, who were both thankful they'd finished the outside.

"You want to take this in the house?" Maddy asked, winking.

Grissom rolled his eyes and followed her into the house. "Let's work from the top," he said, indicating the long flight of stairs. Grinning, Maddy hurried over, pulling the booties over her sneakers to keep her footprints off the carpet. Grissom followed suit, snapping on a pair of latex gloves as they ascended the staircase.

"Oh my God, I love this bedroom," Maddy said as they entered the suite. A king-size bed was the focal point. Resisting the urge to sleep on it, Maddy began to dust the footboard. In response to Grissom's questioning look, she smiled. "You know what Catherine says about guys and leverage. I want to see if Marie Duval was seeing anyone on the side. It could be a suspect, you know." Marie Duval was the wealthy wife of a prosperous businessman, and now she was the victim of a murder case, lumped together with a bunch of poverty-stricken nobodies and middle-class wage-earners. Hardly the kind of people she was expected to associate with.

Grissom inspected the top of the bed-side table, noticing a circle in the shiny surface, as if a maid had cleaned around an object that usually stood there. Remembering what Pam had said, he took a few photos and moved on. He pulled open a drawer and took out a pair of handcuffs. He held them up for Maddy to see. "Kinky," he said, bagging them.

Sighing, Maddy returned to the tedious job of tapelifting the prints from the bed. "Toys aside, these people were busy. Look at all the prints down here!" She grinned as Grissom let out an uncharacteristic laugh, wondering just what had gotten into him to make him so damn cheerful throughout the case.

"Here, let me get that," Grissom said, taking a tapelift from Maddy's gloved hand and pulling a print off the footboard of the bed. Maddy left him to go inspect the shelf under a bow window that had once been a window seat. It now held photographs, mostly of the Marie Duval with her husband. One picture in particular caught her eye. She had to move a wallet-size photo of the husband that was resting on the edges of the frame, and what she saw both shocked and amazed her.

Miss Duval of the lovely mansion was strolling along with two friends on the midway of a traveling carnival. A woman with black hair was to the left, waving at the person holding the camera. "She looks a lot like the woman from the picture on Victoria Anderson's mantle," Maddy thought. She inspected the man to the right of Marie, who was one of the victims; William Terrence. His fingers were entwined in Marie's in a way that suggested a little more than friendship.

Maddy noticed a flesh-colored spot on the corner of the photograph, a finger. "Grissom?" she called to her supervisor. "What do you know about taking pictures of fingerprints?"


End file.
